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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Trigger warning...if you died would you want your partner to find someone else?

181 replies

Addicted2LoveIsland · 02/07/2023 00:51

Genuine question. I understand this might be sensitive to some, but I am genuinely curious. If you passed away would you want your partner/bf/husband to move on and find someone else? Or would you want them to always hold a torch for you and only you?

OP posts:
Addicted2LoveIsland · 02/07/2023 01:22

I can't imagine I would ever want to be with anyone else if something happened to my DP.

If I'm honest, I'm not sure I like the idea of him being with anyone else, but I think I'm still looking at it from the "I'm still alive" perspective. There wouldn't be much I could do about it if that's what he wanted though.

OP posts:
PretzelKnot · 02/07/2023 01:34

I have told my DH that he must get a new partner. He is someone who needs someone. My only caveat is that she must either be childless or have living out of home adult children. Under no circumstances is he to blend children under one roof. I will haunt him if he subjects our kids to that.

Me, I would never repartner. I am an introvert who loves my own company and is perfectly happy single. I would never bring a stepfather into my children’s lives.

summerisontheway · 02/07/2023 01:39

Yes so long as he did not allow her to disinherit the kids.

PissedOffNeighbour22 · 02/07/2023 01:41

I ticked the box on my pension beneficiary form for the payment to be continued in the event my partner remarries, so yes I suppose I would want him to move on. I filled that in before our kids were born though and as they're very young I wouldn't want him to move on too quickly.

I can't imagine meeting anyone else if my DP died. I was pretty much done with men when I met him and I don't think I'd find anyone else I get on with so easily.

I have a friend who was widowed in her early 20s and she's so clearly still in love with him. She married again (to a relative of his) and it's very obvious it's not a great match. She still talks about her first husband constantly and it's over 15yrs since he died.

peachgreen · 02/07/2023 01:41

I always said I wouldn’t want to be with someone else if DH died and he told me not to be silly and that if he died he would want me to meet someone else and for them to love our DD and treat her as his own. In fact he said if he had his way we would forget him completely so we wouldn’t be sad. He lost his own mum young , I think that impacted his thoughts. I couldn’t stand the thought of that at all. But then he did die, leaving me with a 2 year old, and after 18 months or so I did find that I wanted to meet someone else, and I do want them to love DD and for her to grow up feeling she has a father figure. The reality of loss is very different to the hypothetical. Anyway, if something happened to me I would want him to meet someone else and more importantly, I would want someone else to love DD and become her “mum”. The thought breaks my heart but I know it would be better for her.

And now I have to go and give her a cuddle!

SD1978 · 02/07/2023 01:41

If you loved/ liked someone, surely you'd want them to be happy? I wouldn't want someone to be lonely and miserable for the rest of their existence, and I sure as hell wouldn't want that for myself.

BreviloquentBastard · 02/07/2023 01:49

Yes. He's one of the good ones, I'd like to think one day he could make someone else as happy as he's made me if I shuffled off the mortal coil first. As long as he picked someone who was good to our daughter, I would prefer him to keep his heart open to the possibility of love again.

creativebutterfly · 02/07/2023 02:01

No. As if I go before him and the kids I wouldn't want the kids calling another woman mum etc and I've asked my man this and he says he wouldn't look for. Another spouse it would be game over meaning he would just live to die etc.

Theoldgreygoose · 02/07/2023 02:01

I'm no longer in a relationship but if I was then I wouldn't want my partner to be lonely for the rest of their life. There would be no timescale.

creativebutterfly · 02/07/2023 02:02

I'm selfish I would hate the idea of me being dead in the ground and him having feelings or even loving another woman who isn't me.

BadNomad · 02/07/2023 02:05

It doesn't really matter what you want. It's going to be up to them how they live their life when yours is over. You will never know.

PrestonHood121 · 02/07/2023 02:07

Sure but with some stipulations…but since I’d be dead they are irrelevant:

  1. She’d never be as good or better than me. I’ve mentioned this to people before and they’ve agreed they think the same but could never say it lol.
  2. Any resources or assets left by me are for him and our child only. I guess it would ultimately be up him how he spends anything left to him, but hell will freeze over before a penny of my money gets used on some new lady and her kids at the expense of mine.
  3. No woman with or without a bunch of kids, is moving into my house and living it up until my daughter is at uni. Equally, my daughter won’t be uprooting her life to move into some other woman’s / family’s house because its easier for them.

my husband is amazing and I’ve often said it would take about a week before women started “checking” on him once I’m dead with hopes of snapping him up. I’d want him to move on as long as my child comes first and he’s not raising another man’s children 5 mins after I’m dead. But he could do what he wants at the end of the day….

PatienceIsAVirtueInMM · 02/07/2023 02:36

100% and I have told him that.
I've also told our young adult children to make sure he finds someone that makes him happy.
That's how much I love him and want him to be happy♥️
(We are 45 and 43 and have been married for 25 years)

Jemandthehologramsunite · 02/07/2023 03:09

Gosh I feel you'd have to be incredibly selfish to not want them to be able to move on. That's really horrible. You're dead, what do you care.

Jemandthehologramsunite · 02/07/2023 03:10

Jemandthehologramsunite · 02/07/2023 03:09

Gosh I feel you'd have to be incredibly selfish to not want them to be able to move on. That's really horrible. You're dead, what do you care.

Obviously I wouldn't want an evil step mother scenario, so that aside.

KohlaParasaurus · 02/07/2023 03:46

Yes. He's a good man and at his happiest in a relationship.

LovePoppy · 02/07/2023 03:55

I’d hope he’d find a wonderful woman who he loved and who loved him and our children.
even more importantly I’d hope my children would love her, and her them. I’d have they’d have a proper mother and child relationship.

BluebellBlueballs · 02/07/2023 04:26

Yes, but if we had kids living at home I'd want him to very Seriously consider their relationship with our kids

PatienceIsAVirtueInMM · 02/07/2023 04:26

Jemandthehologramsunite · 02/07/2023 03:10

Obviously I wouldn't want an evil step mother scenario, so that aside.

@Jemandthehologramsunite
Frickin obvious...
The question was re whether you wanted your husband to be happy.
Would your husband actually expose your children with "an evil step mother"?
Looks like y'all need to have a serious conversation!

ChubbyMorticia · 02/07/2023 04:27

I wouldn’t care, but good luck getting it past the kids 🤣

I’d definitely want my assets to be given to our kids vs a new wife/step kids he may have though. I don’t want anyone else benefiting from what I’ve worked my butt off for. Our kids shouldn’t get less (or nothing!) because he chooses to remarry.

blahblahblah1654 · 02/07/2023 04:50

LessonLearnedOrLearnt · 02/07/2023 01:12

After Helen McCrory's death, her husband wrote: "She said to us from her bed: 'I want Daddy to have girlfriends, lots of them, you must all love again, love isn't possessive, but you know, Damian, try at least to get through the funeral without snogging someone'."

Aww this made me smile. It was so sad when she passed, what an amazing funny woman she was!

Jemandthehologramsunite · 02/07/2023 04:52

PatienceIsAVirtueInMM · 02/07/2023 04:26

@Jemandthehologramsunite
Frickin obvious...
The question was re whether you wanted your husband to be happy.
Would your husband actually expose your children with "an evil step mother"?
Looks like y'all need to have a serious conversation!

Yes and I answered that question, I just realised that was my caveat!

WandaWonder · 02/07/2023 04:56

Of course I would, I think it is totally weird not too

Snugglemonkey · 02/07/2023 04:59

allmyliesaretrue · 02/07/2023 00:53

I wouldn't care. I'd be dead.

This

Abcdefghik · 02/07/2023 05:03

I'm in this situation. Except it was my husband who died. We had this conversation while he was still alive and we both wanted the other to find someone else. I hope that I find love again. But I'm not hopeful that someone could ever fall in love with me again iyswim.